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CONSTRUCTION bosses will reopen a multi-million regeneration site on Monday - despite Glasgow City Council withdrawing its workers due to coronavirus advice.

The First Minister earlier this week said building sites should cease work in order to help "save lives".

But Morgan Sindall, the contractor working on the £250 million Sighthill Transformational Regeneration Area, is calling staff in to resume work after the weekend.

It is the largest regeneration project in the UK outside of London and will see hundreds of new homes, new shops and businesses, and a new road bridge over the Glasgow to Edinburgh railway line.

The Glasgow Times contacted Morgan Sindall by telephone and email.

However, the company had not responded to our query by the time this newspaper went to print.

A staff member, who asked not to be named, said: "The company is putting the health of its staff at risk.

"There are new rules in place to try to protect us but it's a building site - maintaining a two metre distance and rigorous hand washing is not going to be easy.

"Nicola Sturgeon has been very clear that construction should stop but this is an English company and they are going by Boris Johnson."

READ MORE: The Glasgow firms 'putting staff at risk' despite coronavirus fears

Speaking on Monday, Ms Sturgeon said: “It has been clear to me that there are still too many people across our country who are being expected to, or expecting to, go to work as normal and this presents a serious and unnecessary risk of spreading the virus.

“This morning I was specifically asked on radio about building sites and hair salons and my advice would be to close.

“If our National Health Service becomes overwhelmed people will die needlessly.

"This is about saving lives.”

However, Boris Johnson has not given instructions to close constructions sites, despite calls from Jeremy Corbyn and Sadiq Khan.

Glasgow City Council is one of the major funder for the regeneration project.

READ MORE: Amazon, Diodes and EE heavily criticised as staff told to keep working

A Glasgow City Council spokesman said: “We believe that this work is not essential at this time, and as a result and in line with Government advice, we have withdrawn council staff from the site.

"It is up to Morgan Sindall to give their view on why they feel this work should be considered essential.

"When this crisis is over, we will work with all of our construction contractors to plan our recovery.”